1. Field of the Invention
Computers are playing an ever more important role in the economical, scientific, and educational development of our society. It is therefore not uncommon to see curricula granting them a significant role in the educational process of young children.
Children are most likely to fully utilize the resources that computers have to offer, as they become more comfortable in interacting with their physical interface, in particular the keyboard. Although computer interfacing has been greatly simplified through the standardization of the touch-typing keyboard, much is to be gained from educational systems that can help children to painlessly develop the needed keyboarding skills, as early as pre-school age.
After acquiring keyboarding skills, children will need both lateral and vertical thinking to express their ideas as freely as possible with the computer while accommodating for its hardware/software limitations.
Therefore, much is to be gained from wholistic educational systems that can motivate children, as early as pre-school age, to develop their lateral and vertical thinking skills, while preparing them for keyboarding.
2. Analytical Description of the Relevant Art
Since the invention of the first type-writer, various means and devices have been proposed to teach/train students to type, or to type more efficiently, as exemplified by the following United States and Foreign Patents.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,909,739 issued in 1990 to Ladner et al. entitled "Interactive Typing/Training System" discloses a set or color-coded finger guides to be worn at the top of the hand, and indicating the character of the home key that each finger is to be used for in touch-typing. The color-coding of the keys of the keyboard match the color-coding of the finger guides to indicate to the typist which keys each finger should be used for.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,570,908 issued in 1949 to Behr entitled "Indicator To Be Worn On The Hands While Learning To Typewrite" discloses a device constructed so as to be secured on the hand without impeding the use of the fingers in any way, and showing to the typist the correct keys of a type-writer to be struck by each finger, and the position of the keys relative to the actuating finger.
In the aforementioned patents by Ladher and Behr, the key-finger assignment of the keyboard is indicated to the student-typist by means of devices which represent the keys by the letters and numbers they bear, as specified by the standardized keyboard. Such key-finger assignment cannot however be used by pre-school children, since they do not yet know their alphabet nor their numbers. Moreover, the systems disclosed by Ladner and Behr are to be used by students in the actual act of touch-typing, or keyboarding. The latter training devices have therefore been specifically designed so as not to obstruct the student view of the keyboard, nor impede the free motion of the fingers. Such specificities are of no benefit to pre-school children, since it is highly desirable that they do not actually use the keyboard (because of the fragility of their joints), and are moreover responsible for the awkward characteristics of the aforementioned hand indicators, which would make them impractical to be worn by pre-school children.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,501,849 issued in 1970 to Olsen entitled "Method And Device For Teaching Typing And Language Skills" discloses a set of color-coded bands worn on each finger of the typist, and a set of color-coded discs to be affixed on the keys of a typewriter, whereby the color matching between bands and keys indicate to the typist which keys each finger should be used for.
French Pat. No. 925,459 issued in 1964 to Azan entitled "Dispositif pour le guidage cybernetique des doigts dans l' apprentissage de la dactylographie et permettre la correction de la mauvaise dactylographie" discloses a set of rings to be worn by the student typist. The letters assigned to each ring show to the typist the correct keys of a type-writer to be struck by each finger.
British Pat. No. 931,038 issued in 1963 to Haid entitled "Typewriter Key Markers to Teach Touch Typing" discloses rings which can be placed upon the fingers, and which have the color which marks the keys associated with any particular finger.
U.S. Pat. No. 623,966 issued in 1899 to Barkley entitled "Method Of And Apparatus For Type-Writer Instruction" discloses a set of rings to be worn by a typist with the aim of acquiring speed. The letters assigned to each ring show to the typist the correct keys of a type-writer to be struck by each finger.
In the aforementioned patents by Azan, Haid, and Barkley, the disclosed key-finger assignments are based on indexing the keys of the keyboard by the letters they bear (which index said keys), and therefore could not be used by preschool children, since they do not know their alphabet.
Although the aforementioned ring sets can in principle be used by any student-typist who knows how to read, the bare representation of the keyboard in terms of plain letters can be in practise demotivating for young learners who usually look for excitement in any learning process. Without nurturing the student with opportunities for associative memorization, the learning process may indeed be reduced to just practising on the keyboard, and shy away many potential teenager students.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,465,477 issued in 1984 to AvGavaar entitled "Typewriter Instruction Device" discloses a device consisting of small ferromagnetic tips to be worn by the typist at the ends of his fingers, while the typewriter keys have electromagnets which attract the correct finger when a certain key has to be struck. These electromagnets could be attached at the fingertips by means of gloves, fingercots, or adhesives.
By requiring actual use of the keyboard and knowledge of the alphabet, the training system disclosed by AvGavaar is not adapted to prepare pre-school children for keyboarding for the same reasons mentioned above.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,902,231 issued in 1990 to Freer entitled "Learn To Type Via Mnemonic Devices, And Methods Of Constructing And Utilizing Same" discloses a large chart depicting the standardized computer keyboard, and mnemonic means including visual aids and phrases to help the student typist remember the locations of the keys. The chart is to be positioned within the view of the typing students.
Pre-school children do not know their alphabet, and therefore could not benefit from Freer's mnemonic devices that are based on phrases and pictures showing the phrases. Moreover, the letters indexing the keys of the keyboard are associated in irregular patterns within either words or phrases, which makes it difficult to identify these indexing letters from the pictures. Such mnemonic devices are addressed to the student-typist who knows how to read and make sentences, and present a degree of complexity by far exceeding the level of young children. Moreover, these mnemonic devices are applied to a large chart to be positioned within the view of the student-typist, preferably on the wall of a classroom, which would be of little practicality and convenience for a pre-school child in home environment.
There is therefore a need for process-oriented educational systems that are not only attractive to the child, but also easy-to-use and easy-to-be-accessed, in order to start the keyboarding training process as early as the pre-school-age group.
The present invention differs from the prior art in that it answers the aforementioned need, and provides simple picture-based (or object-based) devices using process-oriented methods in order to:
1) prepare the pre-school child (and any illiterate child or adult) for keyboarding before he has even learned the alphabet and the numbers; PA1 2) while developing his lateral and vertical thinking; PA1 3) and thereby realize a wholistic preparation of the pre-school child (and any illiterate child or adult) towards coping creatively with the inherent hardware/software limitations of the computer; PA1 4) prepare teenagers for keyboarding through a learning process that is well-adapted to the behavioral characteristics of that age-group. PA1 1) training the pre-school child to simultaneously practise his lateral and vertical thinking; PA1 2) indirectly raising the child's awareness to the future necessity of learning about the hardware/software limitations of the computer (e.g. programming language) to be able to use it as creatively and productively as possible; PA1 3) exposing the child at a very early age to the art of compromise, in teaching him the importance of accommodating for the limitations of the outside world without suppressing his own creative abilities.
Further advantages, and differences from the prior art are contained in the further objects and characteristics of the invention, as disclosed in the following summary and detailed description of the invention.